GOP Ignores Cantor Loss, Keeps Driving for Cliff

What’s that old saying about insanity being doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results?

That would be an apt description of the GOP leadership: insane.

It doesn’t take an armload of polls or even an IQ in the double digits to see that the Republican Party is losing its base.

A lot of that has to do with the guys in leadership positions who apparently have no idea what their base is.

That includes guys like Boehner and McConnell who make public spectacles of themselves by promising to “crush” the Tea Party, which these days is the most energetic force the GOP can muster. Then there are the deal makers in the background like string puller Karl Rove, who loathes the uppity Tea Party and lost nearly all his donations after promising to defeat conservative candidates, then still wonders what happened.

Old fossils like McConnell may have enough big-money friends to keep their careers alive even when they’ve alienated conservatives and curried favor with Democrats and the White House, but Eric Cantor paid the price, losing re-election to a Tea Party candidate.

Majority Leader Cantor’s loss could have been the GOP’s gain, a chance to usher in new blood, but instead Republican representatives on Thursday defeated conservative challenger Rep. Raul Labrador — soundly — opting for same-old, same-old in the person of Kevin McCarthy, Cantor’s selected heir.

And why wouldn’t the GOP stick with the same tired strategies, issues and attitudes that have served them so well in the past?

The RINO brand has lost the presidency twice, would have lost them Congress if not for a raft of Tea Party favorites, and now a new Gallup poll has found the approval rating for Congress is at an all-time low of 7 percent.

Any lower and Congress’ approval will be smaller than the margin of error.

In the poll, only 7 percent of respondents expressed “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in Congress as an American institution.

The reason for the low number is obvious. It’s because CONGRESS DOESN’T LISTEN TO VOTERS!

I know. Shocking revelation, isn’t it?

Republican Study Commission Chairman Jim Jordan, in nominating Raul Labrador for majority leader, noted that the election defeat of Eric Cantor was a message from the voters, a “vote of no confidence for not just the Republican leadership, [but] Washington, D.C. generally.”

Heading into midterm elections, the GOP leadership is still refusing to hear that message.

With the Democratic Party stumbling under the weight of the Obama Administration’s numerous scandals and blunders. picking up new seats should be absurdly easy.

Instead, the GOP is working its hardest to ensure that the party keeps on losing.